{"id":59,"date":"2007-11-06T22:21:00","date_gmt":"2007-11-07T02:21:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/?p=59"},"modified":"2007-11-06T22:21:00","modified_gmt":"2007-11-07T02:21:00","slug":"a-short-argument-against-divine-timelessness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/2007\/11\/a-short-argument-against-divine-timelessness\/","title":{"rendered":"A Short Argument against Divine Timelessness"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>First, the position I want to argue against is <em>essential divine timelessness<\/em> &#8211; the idea that, of necessity, God cannot change in any respect or stand in any temporal relations.<\/p>\n<p>Second, here is my argument:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>God is able to exercise providence.<\/li>\n<li>God&#8217;s exercising providence entails the making of choices on God&#8217;s part.<\/li>\n<li>A choice is an essentially temporal event.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>Therefore,<\/p>\n<ol start=\"4\">\n<li>God is not essentially timeless.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>Third, some comments:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>(1) is accepted by (nearly) all theists. What theist wants to deny that God is able to exercise providence, that is, to decide whether to create, what kind of world to create, whether and when to intervene in that world, and so forth?<\/li>\n<li>(2) is accepted by (nearly) all theists. For example, when Calvinists speak of &#8216;election&#8217; and divine &#8216;decrees&#8217; they are speaking about God&#8217;s choices. When Jews speak of themselves as the &#8216;chosen&#8217; people, that means chosen <span style=\"font-style: italic;\">by God<\/span>. Examples could be multiplied, but you get the point.<\/li>\n<li>(3) seems to be a conceptual truth. To make a choice one must, first, have a range of two or more available options (I can do either A or B or &#8230;) and, second, narrow down that range to one (say, A). These two stages of choice give us a &#8216;before&#8217; and &#8216;after&#8217;, a real change or transition from one to the other. Hence, choices are essentially temporal events.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>If this is right, then while the proponent of essential divine timelessness can say that God eternally &#8216;wills&#8217; A, he cannot literally and consistently hold that God &#8216;chooses&#8217; A. This conflicts with divine freedom. An essentially timeless God can no more exercise providence or &#8216;elect&#8217; someone unto salvation than a rock can &#8216;choose&#8217; to stay where it&#8217;s at.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>First, the position I want to argue against is essential divine timelessness &#8211; the idea that, of necessity, God cannot change in any respect or stand in any temporal relations. Second, here is my argument: God is able to exercise providence. God&#8217;s exercising providence entails the making of choices on God&#8217;s part. A choice is\u2026 <span class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/2007\/11\/a-short-argument-against-divine-timelessness\/\">Read More &raquo;<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-59","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}